Optical recording medium having recording capacity information and method for indicating recording capacity

ABSTRACT

An optical recording medium and a method for recording information to indicate a recording capacity of the recording medium, are provided. The method includes recording information to indicate a varied recording capacity on a particular area of the optical recording medium, if an initial recording capacity of the optical recording medium is varied based upon at least one of an assignment and a variance of a spare area for a defect management, the spare area being assigned to an inner area and/or an outer area of the optical recording medium, or being varied toward an inner direction with respect to an outer position.

CROSS-REFERENCE

The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/387,853 (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,788,631 B1 issued Sep. 7, 2004) filed on Sep. 1, 1999 for which priority is claimed under 35 U.S.C. § 120, the entire contents of this application are herein fully incorporated by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a rewritable optical recording medium system, and more particularly, to an optical recording medium having an indication of a recording capacity, and a method for indicating a recording capacity of an optical recording medium.

2. Background of the Invention

In general, the optical recording media are sorted as a ROM type for read only, a WORM type for writing once, and a rewritable type for repetitive writing. In disks which are rewritable freely and repetitively, there are CD-RW (Rewritable Compact Disc), and rewritable digital versatile disc (DVD-RW, DVD-RAM, DVD+RW).

FIG. 1 illustrates an architecture of the rewritable optical disk, provided with, starting from inside, a lead-in area, a data area, and a lead-out area. The data area is divided into zone units for random access, each zone provided with a user area and a spare area for use when a defect is occurred in the user area.

Referring to FIG. 2, the lead-in area is provided with an embossed data zone, a mirror zone, and a rewritable data zone. The embossed data zone, an area preformatted in the disk fabrication process, has a recorded data change of which is impossible. The embossed data zone in turn is provided with a blank zone, a reference signal zone, a blank zone, a control data zone, and a blank zone. The control data zone contains an embossed data field, and the data field contains embossed control data. The control data has 192 ECC (error correction code) blocks, and each ECC block has 16 sectors. A first sector in each block contains physical format information, a second sector contains disk manufacturing information, and the rest of the sectors are left unused. And, the rewritable data zone, an area provided for rewriting control information varied with data rewriting, has a protection track zone, a disk test zone, a drive test zone, a protection track zone, a disk ID (identification) zone, and defect management areas (DMA1 & DAM2) for managing defects in the disk. The optical disk has a variety of recording capacities, such as 2.6 G (giga byte), 4.58 G, 4.7 G, and etc., determined according to track pitches which are distances between pit lines.

However, the recording capacity of a disk may differ even if the track pitch and a size of the disk (for example, 8 cm or 12 cm) are identical. For example, if a spare area in a data area is employed as a user area according to a disk manufacturing process or reformatting, or according to a size of a spare area allocated, the recording capacity of the disk may differ even if the track pitch or the disk size is identical. The spare area may be fixed or varied by enlargement as necessary. Herein, one example of the disk in which the spare area is fixed is called a mode-1, and one example of the disk in which the spare area is varied by enlargement or extension is called a mode-2. In the case of mode-1, for setting an initial data recording capacity (a user area) to be 4.58 GB, the spare area is allocated to be 145 MB (=megabyte) everytime. In the mode-1, the 145 MB of the spare area may be allocated on top of the user area entirely as shown in FIG. 4A, or divided to top and bottom of the user area as shown in FIG. 4B, when 25 MB may be allocated to the top and the rest is allocated to the bottom by taking interchangeability with the mode-2 into consideration. The spare area allocated to the top is called as a primary spare area (first SA), and the spare area allocated to the bottom is called as a supplementary spare area (second SA). In the case of mode-2, in order to set an initial data recording capacity (i.e., a user area) to be 4.7 GB, 26 MB is allocated as the spare area. In this instance, as shown in FIG. 4C, the 26 MB is assigned to the first spare area in formatting, a second spare area maybe allocated to the bottom additionally as necessary, or may be enlarged. In every one of the foregoing operations, the recording capacity of the disk is varied. In those instances, the disk recording capacity can not be known only from a size of track pitch or disk, which impedes recording or reproduction of an accurate amount of data.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, the present invention is directed to an optical recording medium having an indication of a recording capacity, and a method for indicating a recording capacity of an optical recording medium that substantially obviates one or more of the problems due to limitations and disadvantages of the related art.

An object of the present invention is to provide an optical recording medium having an indication of a recording capacity at a particular area thereof.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a method for indicating a recording capacity of an optical recording medium, which can indicate an initial recording medium of the recording medium at a particular area of the optical recording medium and can indicate a changed recording capacity if the recording capacity is changed.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a method for indicating a recording capacity of an optical recording medium, in which identification information for indicating a recording capacity of the optical recording medium is provided at a particular area of the optical recording medium for indicating an initial recording capacity of the optical recording medium.

Additional features and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description which follows, and in part will be apparent from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objectives and other advantages of the invention will be realized and attained by the structure particularly pointed out in the written description and claims hereof as well as the appended drawings.

It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory and are intended to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with the description serve to explain the principles of the invention:

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 illustrates an architecture of a related art rewritable optical disk;

FIG. 2 illustrates an architecture of a lead in area shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 illustrates an architecture of a control block in the control data zone in FIG. 2;

FIGS. 4A˜4C illustrate allocation examples of a first spare area and a second spare area in a related art optical recording medium depending on modes;

FIG. 5A illustrates an example of an initial recording capacity, which is determined by default, indicated in an unused area of a control data zone in the lead-in area in a method for indicating a recording capacity according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 5B illustrates an example of a variable recording capacity indicated in an unused area of a rewritable data zone in the lead-in area in a method for indicating a recording capacity according to an embodiment of the present invention; and,

FIG. 6 illustrates an example of an initial recording capacity, which is determined by default, indicated by using identification information in a method for indicating a recording capacity according to an embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

Reference will now be made in detail to the preferred embodiments of the present invention, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. The present invention indicates an initial recording capacity (or a recording capacity determined by default), and a varied recording capacity if the recording capacity is varied. The initial recording capacity may be determined by the manufacturer or the user. The initial recording capacity is indicated in a particular area of the optical disk, for example, in the lead-in area. In this instance, the initial recording capacity may be indicated in an unused area of an embossed data zone, or a rewritable data zone of the lead-in area. In the case the initial recording capacity is indicated in the embossed data zone of the lead-in area according to the present invention, as shown in FIG. 5A, the initial recording capacity can be indicated, for example, on unused bytes (such as bytes of BP 17˜31, or 33˜47) of a first sector containing physical format information among control data blocks in the control data zone of the embossed data zone.

The recording capacity may be varied with the user's reformatting, or an additional allocation of spare areas (for example, like mode-2 ). That is, if a spare area is formatted into a user area, the recording capacity of the disk can be increased. Or, the disk recording capacity may be reduced by allocating a spare area as the case demands. Therefore, preferably a changed recording capacity may not be indicated in an unused area in the embossed data zone of the lead-in area, because a data written on the embossed data zone in the lead-in area is not correctable. Instead, as shown in FIG. 5B, the variable recording capacity may be indicated on a disk ID zone or an unused area of DMA area in the rewritable data zone. In a case when the initial recording capacity of the optical disk is indicated on the rewritable data zone, the recording capacity varied thereafter can be overwritten on the same position. Once such an optical disk recording/reproduction is selected, recording/reproduction may be conducted with reference to the recording capacity indicated on the unused area of the rewritable data zone without variation of the recording capacity, separately. For example, if the recording capacity is indicated to be 4.7 G, data may be recorded or reproduced as much as 4.7 G, or if the recording capacity is indicated to be 4.58 G, data may be recorded or reproduced as much as 4.58 G.

If the initial recording capacity and the varied recording capacity of the optical disk are indicated at positions different from each other, the initial recording capacity or the varied recording capacity may be referred to depending on the fact of variation of the recording capacity. That is, the initial recording capacity may be indicated on the embossed data zone in the lead-in area, and the varied recording capacity may be indicated on the rewritable data zone separately, or the initial recording capacity and the varied recording capacity may be indicated at different positions of the rewritable data zone, respectively. In this instance, the fact of variation of the recording capacity may be indicated by using another additional information, or the fact of variation of the recording capacity may be made identifiable by displaying the recording capacity with a value (for example, minimum or maximum) indicating that the recording capacity is not varied until the recording capacity is varied, and by indicating the varied recording capacity on the area in which the varied recording capacity is to be indicated, if the recording capacity is varied.

Once such an optical disk recording/reproduction is selected, variation of the recording capacity is checked with reference to the area where the additional information or the varied recording capacity is indicated. If it is found that the recording capacity is not varied, the initial recording capacity (for example, the recording capacity written in the embossing data zone in the lead-in area) is read in data writing or reading. If it is found that the recording capacity is varied, the varied recording capacity (for example, the recording capacity recorded in the rewritable data zone in the lead-in area) is read in data writing or reading. For example, if the initial recording capacity is 4.7 G, and the spare area is allocated as necessary to reduce the recording capacity down to 4.58 G, data as much as 4.7 G can be recorded or reproduced until a variation of the recording capacity, and data as much as 4.58 G can be recorded or reproduced after the variation of the recording capacity.

In the meantime, the initial recording capacity of the optical disk maybe indicated by using identification information. That is, as shown in FIG. 6, the initial recording capacity may be indicated with the identification information added to a particular area (for example, DMA in the lead-in area, especially, unused areas of SDL or DDS). For example, if the optical disk is formatted in, or converted to mode-1, the identification information is reset to ‘0’, and if the optical disk is formatted in, or converted to mode-2, the identification information is set to ‘1’. Reset of the identification information to ‘0’ implies that the optical disk has a fixed recording capacity without variation of the spare area, and the identification information set at ‘1’ implies that the optical disk has a varied recording capacity as the spare area is enlarged as necessary. Accordingly, if the identification information is ‘0’ in recording/reproduction, the mounted optical disk is determined to be in mode-1, and up to 4.58 G data may be written or read. And, if the identification information is ‘1’ in recording/reproduction, the mounted optical disk is in mode-2, and up to 4.7 G data may be written or read. Thus, a disk capacity, i.e., kind of disks dependent on the disk capacity can be known.

As has been explained, the optical recording medium having an indication of a recording capacity, and the method for indicating a recording capacity of an optical recording medium of the present invention facilitates recording or reproducing of an accurate amount of data by indicating the initial recording capacity determined by default and the varied recording capacity by additional allocation of the spare area and the like on particular areas of the optical recording medium. The present invention allows a data writing or reading with reference to the initial recording capacity or the varied recording capacity depending on a state of variation of the recording capacity. The present invention also facilitates a mode selection and mode conversion and an accurate amount of data recording or reproducing even if the initial size of the first spare area in the mode-1 and mode-2 is the same by indicating the initial recording capacity with the identification information and performing the data recording or reproducing operation with reference to the identification information.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made in the optical recording medium having an indication of a recording capacity and the method for indicating a recording capacity of an optical recording medium of the present invention without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modifications and variations of this invention provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents. 

1. A method for recording information associated with a recording capacity of an optical recording medium, comprising the steps of: determining whether a spare area is assigned to the optical recording medium or a size of the spare area is varied, the spare area being assigned to an outer area of the optical recording medium or being varied toward an inner direction from an outer position; and recording or updating information to reflect a varied recording capacity of a user data area on a particular area of the optical recording medium, based upon a result of the determining step, wherein the information reflects the varied recording capacity excluding at least a size of the spare area assigned within the user data area if the spare area is assigned or the size of the spare area is varied.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the particular area is a writable area of a lead-in area of the optical recording medium.
 3. The method of claim 1, further comprising: recording or changing identification information to identity that the recording capacity is varied.
 4. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the information indicates a usable recording capacity of the user data area within the optical recording medium.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein the spare area is a supplementary spare area.
 6. The method of claim 5, wherein the spare area is assigned or varied during formatting process or during recording mode.
 7. A method for recording or reproducing data on or from an optical recording medium, the method comprising the steps of: reading information reflecting a recording capacity of the optical recording medium from a particular area of the optical recording medium, the information being varied based on an assignment of spare area and/or a variance of a size of the spare area, the spare area being assigned to an inner area and/or outer area of the optical recording medium or being varied toward an inner direction from an outer position, wherein the information reflects the recording capacity excluding at least the size of the spare area assigned within a user data are if the spare area is assigned or the size of the spare area is varied; and controlling a data recording or reproducing operation with reference to a usable recording capacity of the user data area reflected by the information.
 8. The method of claim 7, wherein the reading step reads the information based on an identification information to indicate whether the recording capacity is varied.
 9. The method of claim 7, wherein the spare area is assigned or varied during formatting process or during recording mode.
 10. An optical recording medium comprising: a spare area for a defect management, the spare area being assigned to an inner area and/or an outer area of the optical recording medium, or being varied toward an inner direction from an outer position; and an information recorded on a particular area of the optical recording medium, wherein the information reflects a recording capacity of the optical recording medium, and the information is varied based upon at least one of the assignment or variance of the spare area, wherein the information reflects the recording capacity excluding at least a size of the spare area assigned within a user data area if the spare area is assigned or the size of the spare area is varied.
 11. The optical recording medium of claim 10, wherein the information is recorded on a writable area of the optical recording medium.
 12. The optical recording medium of claim 11, wherein the writable area is a defect management area within a lead-in area of the optical recording medium.
 13. The optical recording medium of claim 10, wherein the information indicates a usable recording capacity of a user data area within the optical recording medium.
 14. The optical recording medium of claim 10, wherein the spare area includes a primary spare area being assigned to the inner area of the optical recording medium, and a supplementary spare area being assigned to the outer area of the optical recording medium or being varied toward the inner direction from the outer position.
 15. The optical recording medium of claim 14, wherein the information is varied based upon at least the assignment or variance of the supplementary spare area.
 16. The method of claim 1, wherein as the size of the spare area is varied, the information reflecting the varied recording capacity excluding the varied size of the spare are is recorded on a rewritable area of the optical recording medium.
 17. The method of claim 7, wherein as the size of the spare area is varied and thus the recording capacity is varied, the information reflecting the varied recording capacity excluding the varied size of the spare are is recorded on a rewritable area of the optical recording medium.
 18. The optical recording medium of claim 10, wherein as the size of the spare area is varied and thus the recording capacity is varied, the information reflecting the varied recording capacity excluding the varied size of the spare are is recorded on a rewritable area of the optical recording medium. 